


Nobody Likes a Quitter

by Needle_Bones



Category: Outlast (Video Games)
Genre: Canon-Typical Violence, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-15
Updated: 2015-04-15
Packaged: 2018-03-23 01:51:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,693
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3750451
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Needle_Bones/pseuds/Needle_Bones
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Personally, I like Trager's brand of insanity but a friend of mine suggested badass!Miles and I thought 'Why not?'</p>
            </blockquote>





	Nobody Likes a Quitter

“ _Fuck!_ ”

Trager was yelling from the next room. He must have noticed the empty chair. Miles dropped to the grimy tile floor with a grunt and crawled under one of the beds before that psycho ‘doctor’ wandered back in.

“ _Fuck – really?_ You’re gonna walk on me? If there’s _one thing I cannot God-damn stand, it’s a quitter_!  _Come on_!”

He wanted to run. Of course he did – who in their right mind wouldn’t? – but Trager was pacing, slinking through the spaces between the beds like some mutated lion, occasionally hitting the floor to check under the frames. It would be hell getting past him. Miles was pretty sure he was faster – and that there was an open vent somewhere around here – but with his hands butchered like they were, he wasn’t in love with the thought of pulling himself up.

He relaxed just enough to let the ragged edge of bone where his left ring finger used to be touch the tile and instantly regretted it. The bone had splinted and a few pieces shifted under his skin.

He curled his hands up about an inch or so, and took a deep, slow breath. It didn’t help much.

_Don’t throw up._  he thought, swallowing hard and wincing as his throat burned. _Mind off the pain, remember? You’ve been in rough spots before and that’s always worked. Don’t think about it._

Hell, he didn’t really  _want_  to move at all but that doctor would eventually find him if he stayed put and he was decently sure that 'evisceration' was one of Trager's favourite words.

There was an elevator back up the hall. If he could get there, he might have a chance. It took a key though and that was a problem. But it had to be somewhere, right? If he moved fast and stayed quiet, he could probably find it. Yeah. Sure.

Miles waited until Trager moved on before he drug himself out from under the bed, slowly and as quietly as he could.

_All right. All right, you can figure this out._

Losing two fingers was quickly dropping on the list of things that scared him. He was still bleeding but it wasn’t as steady as it had been so he could deal with it later. He ducked back through from the larger room, paused by the elevator just long enough to confirm that it did, in fact, need a key to work, and then clambered up onto a gurney. There was an open air vent just above it.

He never heard Trager walking up. It never occurred to him that the man would still be around until there was this sharp, stabbing pain in the back of his leg. Miles fought the scream down to a loud, echoing yelp and jumped, haphazard and sprawling, kicking and clawing, into the vent.

He heard Trager sigh from down below. “Hey! You know, nobody likes a quitter.”

_Oh my God, shut up!_

Miles didn’t say it out loud, of course. He couldn’t. Between the raw ache that had settled into his throat from screaming and vomiting earlier, and the jolt of the slow, burning wound in the back of his calf, his voice was shot. He hated how he went mute like that. Granted, being scared out of his wits at least half of the time didn’t exactly lend itself to eloquent speech but a curse or two would have been rather fitting right about then.

He made sure his legs were clear of the open grate (and that Trager didn’t have it in his head to climb up after him) and curled up with his spine pressed against the side of the vent. He’d move on, sure, just… not right now.

He wrapped his right arm across his aching ribcage and pressed the heel of his left hand against his temple, careful not to let his injured finger get caught in his hair. Cold, stale air bled into his skin, digging into his bones, and he shivered. His stomach twisted and he wretched hard, bringing up stringy, red fluid. His throat was bleeding. Wonderful.

Crawling for a while dropped him into a hallway near a rusted metal rack – the same kind he used to block the doors before Trager sucker-punched him. If he leaned against the door it stood in front of, he could see the room he just came from - and the elevator. Miles took a slow breath, checked the hallway behind him, tried not to look at the jagged ends of bone where two of his fingers used to be, and threw his weight against the metal. Coming in this way would be a lot easier than trying to loop back around.

_See? You’re fine. You’re thinking – thinking is good._

Trager, with his shoulders hunched and head down but his eyes sharp, stepped out from a room further up the hall. Miles held his breath and moved to his right. It put his back to the now-unblocked door but it also put him in total darkness. The hallway in front of him, thankfully, was much shorter and ended in a boarded-shut door. A dead-end.

Miles shoved his back against the wall and edged just close enough to the corner to lean around it. No Trager. He brought his camera up and zoomed in as far as he could. The door at the far end of the hall was blocked off the same way the one in front of him had been.

Great.

So now that maniac was skulking around and  _fuck_ , it was hard to even stand for too long with that gash in his leg, never mind running on it. Still, if he could get through there…

_Screw it._

Miles limped, staggered, and finally braced himself against the wall. He wasn't gushing blood but the back of his pant leg was now a much darker blue and the fabric was heavy - wet and cold against his skin. Just like all of his other nightmares, the hallway was long and there were several open doors. Nothing about this was even approaching ‘smart’ but he couldn’t just hang around and wait. At the best, his muscles would lock up or he’d go into shock.

Thankfully, it was a little easier to move the other cart – or maybe he’d just stopped noticing all the aches and pains he was working though. He was reaching for the doorknob when he heard that…  _psychopath’s_  voice from down the hall, light and casual and enough to make him gag all over again.

“Aren’t you a slippery little fucker?” Trager said, bounding up to him like a gazelle on meth. He almost sounded… amused.

Miles spun and nearly fell through the door. He slammed it behind him and left his hand up just long enough to flip Trager off. It was a completely pointless gesture, of course, but somehow it made him feel just slightly better.

Down the hall to the right, up through the vent. That dropped him into a small room and as soon as his feet were on the ground, Miles collapsed against the cold, cracked drywall, breathing too hard and too shallow. The adrenaline was cutting off which meant he was not only shaking but freezing too. His head hurt, his leg was seizing up, his hands ached, and he was drooling – of all things – from the pain. He sighed though his teeth and wiped his mouth on his jacket sleeve.

_I'm getting too old for this._

A set of double doors, then left and over the low wall that led into the room. The key was just hanging there, plain as anything, on a corkboard behind the closed door. Of course, as soon as Miles had the metal thing in his hand, Trager saw fit to stab that damn set of over-large shears into the door.

The run back was a blur but Miles stopped cold just inside the elevator. His heart was slamming against his ribcage and he wasn't breathing right. His ears were ringing. But there was this small, clear spark of anger just under his ribs. He wasn’t a fighter, and he knew that, but still... He turned the key and ran, letting the grate close on the empty lift.

He looped around the corner, the way he'd originally gone, and crouched down, watched as Trager skidded to a stop and the elevator disappeared, leaving the shaft nothing but dark, open air. The doctor snarled, cursed, spun on his heel and started to walk.

He could just stay hidden. That would probably be a hell of a lot safer. What had he been thinking? But instead Miles picked up… something – he wasn’t sure what it was but he could be fairly sure he didn’t want to know – and threw it. Not at Trager (no, he wasn’t quite that suicidal, even now), but into the open elevator shaft.

Whatever it was clattered and echoed as it fell and Trager ran back to the edge of the opening, dropping to his hands and knees to look down.

There was a metal pipe on the ground just out of Miles’ reach. It was cold and rusted and too heavy in his hands.

“I’m not givin’ up on you, buddy!” Trager was yelling down.

Miles stood up and pressed his shoulder against the doorframe.  _Stop shaking_. He walked up to him, casual, the pipe held loosely in one hand. His grip felt awkward without his ring finger, but that barely mattered then. He took a deep breath and brought his other hand up, lifting the pipe to rest on his shoulder. He had one shot at this.

“Hey,  _buddy_.”

Trager sat up, his expression a mix of confusion and interest, just in time for the pipe to connect with the side of his head. It made this God-awful crunching sound when it hit and Trager toppled over the edge like a ragdoll. His scissors skidded over and fell after him but Miles couldn’t see where they landed. Wherever it was, it made this gristly, snapping sound.

The elevator slid back into place and the grating slid open. Miles kept the pipe with him.


End file.
